LA CONNER — Elaine Atterbury Anderson admits her genealogy interest is “excessive.”

“For anniversaries, we will go somewhere and do genealogy research,” said Anderson, whose husband, David Anderson, shares the interest.

On Thursday, the Hoquiam couple’s obsession was well placed at the Skagit County Pioneer Association’s 104th Annual Pioneer Picnic. The Atterburys, also spelled Atterberry, were named the association’s 2008 Family Contributing to Family Spirit.

“It is a family that we feel just kind of has that pioneer spirit,” said Susan Gardner Deyo, the association’s president.

They have an entrepreneurial attitude and are willing to try new things, she said.

The Youngquist or Jungquist family was also recognized at the annual picnic held at Pioneer Park. They took the association’s Pioneer Family of the Year award for their long Skagit Valley lineage, said Deyo.

The Jungquists came to Skagit County from Sweden in 1886. Brothers Frank and John Jungquist arrived first and were followed two years later by the their father August. But it was an arrival two years later that really grew the family.

Sisters Elin and Amanda Wersen, of Omaha, took the train out west expecting to meet their own brothers. But the Wersen brothers did not make it to the train station that day and in their place were John and Frank Jungquist.

“Hmm those look like nice girls,” Deyo said of the Jungquist brothers’ first impression.

“And hmm those look like eligible bachelors,” she said of the Wersen sisters.

The next year John married Amanda and Frank married Elin in a double ring ceremony.

Elaine Atterbury Anderson’s origins in Skagit County date back to an even more dizzying marriage.

Pointing at a double wedding portrait, Anderson said her grandfather George Atterbury married her grandmother Bessie Mae Tippie. And Bessie Mae’s brother Wylie Tippie married George Atterbury’s niece Effie Atterbury, she said.

“You guys will need to pay attention,” said Deyo as she recapped the Atterbury family history for the picnic crowd of a few hundred. “This is a large family.”

The Atterberrys, an English family said to have ties to Queen Anne of Old England, came to Skagit County in 1900 via train and covered wagon from Kansas and Missouri. George was the first member of the family to come to the region, in 1903, and was followed by several others who eventually settled in Lyman and Hamilton.

And plenty of Atterberrys and Atterburys, plus Youngquists and Jungquists, are still around.

Showing the entrepreneurial or pioneer spirit, said Deyo, the Atterburys have started many local businesses including Bunnies by the Bay, Alaska Ocean Seafoods Factory Trawler, as well other shops and an now gone lunch room popular among Anacortes High School students called “Seahawk Haven.”

The Jungquists or Youngquists also have a family trade — public office.

“They seem to have a propension for public office,” said Van Youngquist, the grandson of John and Amanda.

Van Youngquist, 70, of Longview, said he served as a Cowlitz County Councilman for five terms, another family member served as Skagit County prosecutor, Katie Jungquist is the Skagit County treasurer, and Jeanne Youngquist, who serves on the pioneer association board and was present Thursday, is the county auditor.

Deyo did not have a count Thursday for this year’s picnic, which usually draws between 300 and 400 people. But there were at least 25 Atterburys or Atterberrys in attendance. And many of them flocked around Elaine Atterbury Anderson as the event ended.

Anderson and her husband fielded questions about ancestors and displayed a family tree, a 25-foot roll of paper that stretched across several tables, and dates back about seven generations to 1833.

* Elliott Wilson can be reached at 360-416-2147 or at .